The carrier introduced the charge for GDS bookings, known as the Distribution Cost Charge (DCC), on September 1, 2015, despite heavy criticism from travel management companies. The charge can be avoided by booking directly with Lufthansa Group.
GTMC said that research using data from members showed that Lufthansa’s share of traffic from the UK to Germany dropped by 8.5 percentage points from 32.9% in June, before the GDS charge was implemented, to 24.4% in November.
But Lufthansa said that these figures were only for bookings made by GTMC members and did not include the rise in sales through other channels such as its website.
“We have sold more tickets online via our own online channel, LH.com, where the share has risen from 29% in June 2015 to 35% in December 2015,” said the airline in a statement.
“Looking at bookings across the Lufthansa Group we cannot see any decrease due to the introduction of the DCC.
“The published traffic figures for the later months of 2015 were influenced by the biggest and longest strike action in the Lufthansa history. Even taking this into account, we cannot see any switch away from Lufthansa.”
The DCC charge also applies for bookings made on Lufthansa’s sister airlines Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines and Swiss.
GTMC said it analysed 12,000 flight transactions booked through its members, which also showed that British Airways’ UK-Germany market share had “remained steady” between June and November, while easyJet was among the airlines to see a rise in bookings.
Paul Wait, GTMC chief executive, said: “We predicted that the Lufthansa charge would upset and put business travel bookers off. They haven’t booked directly with Lufthansa as they hoped, instead, they have voted with their feet and taken their business elsewhere.
“In this highly competitive market, we believe, this charge has done some obvious damage to Lufthansa’s market share. It is a flawed and failed strategy which should be reviewed.”
Lufthansa said it was continuing to make “a huge effort” to create “modern and alternative” direct distribution channels.
“We have several direct connect projects currently being implemented with our partner tour operators, online booking engines and corporates,” added the airline group.
“The customer should only pay the service he or she receives. If they use a more expensive sales channel, they have to share the higher cost of this booking method.”
Other legacy airlines are watching how Lufthansa gets on with this strategy. Willie Walsh, chief executive of British Airways’ owner International Airlines Group, has said he “admires” the move.
